In our last blog post, we made the case that sales is a customer service Touch Point. To see if that theory holds up, let’s examine our current sales processes, and see if they promote better service. Home Office has created two specific sales tools for you to use: 7-in-7 and Direct Sales Dial-Up. We’ll start by looking at these, and see if they’re helping you win the Service Revolution.
Hopefully, you’re all using the 7-in-7 program by now. We launched it just after the conference in July. 7-in-7 is an automated sales tool that allows you to pick your most promising sales leads and ensure they receive multiple touches from you (specifically, 7 contacts in 7 weeks).
What’s so personal about this method, is that the customer makes repeated contact with you before they are even a customer. Through a mix of direct mail, eblasts, and follow-up calls, you are working to build a relationship. This is more than simply sending out a postcard and seeing who bites. It’s carefully crafting a message and cultivating a two-way conversation.
And remember: 7-in-7 doesn’t target just anybody. You select the leads you want to pursue, and the process narrows it down further. At the end, you’re left with prospects for a new client relationship, or even, new clients.
We feel pretty strongly about this methodology. “Sales” gets a bad reputation, and sometimes it’s deserved. Making touches to people who aren’t interested, or who have no investment in your service, is the opposite of radical personalization. 7-in-7 avoids this.
Direct Sales Dial-Up is a brand new program, just launched earlier this year, if you recall. How is this program an example of radical personalization? Because you work with us to select the people you want to call, and a team from U.S. Lawns Home Office makes contact on your behalf to set up a sales appointment.
Think about the impression that makes on a prospective customer. It’s personal and the caller is a member of U.S. Lawns’ team (not a call center). Furthermore, it sends a message that the national company has confidence in you as a local owner—and is taking time to promote your services. That doesn’t sound like a big, corporate landscape company. Rather, it tells the customer we’re a national name who does business by local connections.
And nobody else in the industry can offer that kind of service.
If you’re not already using these sales tools, we encourage you to get started now. You’ll be developing new business built on service-based relationships. That’s our goal.
Stay tuned for more sales support strategies, currently in the innovation stage at the Home Office.
